SUPER BOWL XXVIII: Sports of The Times; For Battered Buffalo, It Will Be a Colder And Longer Winter

By DAVE ANDERSON

Published: January 31, 1994

ATLANTA—
TURN up the furnaces in Buffalo; it's going to be an ever longer, colder winter there now.

The Bills lost another Super Bowl.

Order more shovels and rock salt; all the snowbanks and ice slicks there might never melt now.

The Bills lost another Super Bowl.

Send truckloads of earmuffs to Buffalo; everybody there won't want to hear all the jokes now.

The Bills lost another Super Bowl.

To make it even bleaker up there on the shores of Lake Erie, for a while last night it appeared that the Bills might win, that the Bills might finally flip those three Super Bowl monkeys off their backs. But now there's a fourth monkey perched there after their 30-13 loss to the Dallas Cowboys in the Georgia Dome sound studio.

To make it even more galling, the Bills lost it by doing exactly the opposite of what their scholarly coach, Marv Levy, had advised them to do.

"One," Levy had said in listing what the Bills must do if they were to win, "don't think you can stop Emmitt Smith and you've got it won. Two, no play is over until it's over, and then it's over. Three, protect the ball and get the ball."

When the Bills were leading at halftime, 13-6, they had held Smith to only 41 rushing yards. But the Bills didn't have it won.

And as soon as the third quarter began, the Bills violated two of Levy's tenets. Thurman Thomas forgot to protect the ball, James Washington scooped up the fumble, some of the Bills seemed frozen in time as if a whistle had blown, and the Cowboys' free safety hurried 46 yards for the tying touchdown.

With the game now up for grabs at 13-13, Emmitt Smith showed why he is the National Football League's best running back. With the Cowboys starting at their 36-yard line, he rushed for 61 of the 64 yards in the touchdown drive, including a 15-yard burst into the end zone.

Emmitt Smith right for 9 yards, Emmitt Smith right for 3 yards, Emmitt Smith right for 9 yards, Emmitt Smith left for 7 yards, Emmitt Smith right for 14 yards, Emmitt Smith right for 4 yards to the Bills' 22.

After a 3-yard gain on Troy Aikman's short pass to fullback Darryl Johnston created a crucial third-and-3 at the Bills' 15, Aikman pitched to Smith who slipped through nose tackle Jeff Wright as if he were a greased pig and rumbled across the goal line.

"We didn't make tackles; we missed tackles," Bills linebacker Darryl Talley said later. "We were reaching for people instead of running through them."

At the end, Smith had rushed for 132 yards in 30 carries and two touchdowns while catching 4 passes for 26 yards, an improvement even on his performance a year ago when he had 108 yards on 22 carries and one touchdown as the Cowboys crushed the Bills, 52-17. For all of quarterback Troy Aikman's artistry as a passer, Smith is surely the most coveted Cowboy.

With his Super Bowl most valuable player award, Smith completed an unprecedented sweep of the National Football League's regular-season most valuable player award and the rushing title.

"Blocking for Emmitt," said the 325-pound guard Nate Newton, "is the easiest job in the world because you don't block long, a split second. When we had Herschel Walker, we had an elephant offense -- Herschel to the right, Herschel to the left, Herschel up your back. We got Emmitt and it was Emmitt to the right, Emmitt to the left, Emmitt around you."

Emmitt Smith did for the Cowboys what Thurman Thomas had hoped to do for the Bills.

Throughout all the Super Bowl hoopla, Smith kept saying that Thomas was pro football's best running back and Thomas kept saying that Smith was pro football's best running back. Thomas was correct, Smith was wrong -- the only mistake he made here all week.

If the Bills were to win, Thomas had to rumble. Instead, he not only was limited to 37 yards on 16 carries but he lost two fumbles that provided the Cowboys with a total of 10 points -- Washington's touchdown and Eddie Murray's second of three field goals.

"I can take the blame; I changed the momentum," said Thomas, who sat out the final quarter with cramped calf muscles. "It was a devastating loss, but I'm not going to drink myself to death or kill myself."

Thomas now must live with an even larger fourth monkey on his back than the rest of his teammates while the Cowboys celebrate being only the fifth franchise to wear two consecutive Super Bowl rings; the others were the Packers, Dolphins, Steelers (twice) and 49ers.

And if Emmitt Smith, whose right shoulder still hasn't completely healed from the separation suffered in the regular-season finale at Giants Stadium, stays healthy, the Cowboys might win three in a row. Especially if the Bills emerge as the American Conference champion again.

"We feel sorry for 'em," Michael Irvin, the Cowboy wide receiver, said of the Bills, "but we couldn't help it."

The Cowboys couldn't help winning because they were the better team. Again. Just as the Bills couldn't help losing because they were the lesser team. Again.